England must prove they can be ruthless... just like the Australians (and they'll have to avoid being described as the C-word)

We may be about to learn something new about this England team. From Thursday onwards in Manchester, we may be about to learn whether they can add ruthlessness to the list of abstract nouns that have so far defined their series – principally, patience at Trent Bridge and power at Lord’s.

Not since 1928-29 have England won the first three Tests of an Ashes series – a feat which Australia, on the other hand, have achieved three times in the last decade-and-a-bit alone.

The difference can partly be ascribed to quality: in 2001, 2002-03 and 2006-07, the Australians possessed one of the great teams of all time. But there is a stereotype to overcome here, too. As Andrew Strauss himself admitted at the end of his final Test as captain, England prefer to hunt than be hunted. Being startled creatures in the headlights has never come easily.

Jumping for joy: England celebrate their first Test victory at Trent Bridge

Manchester’s weather permitting, they may never get a better chance both to take another step on the path towards the history of a 5-0 whitewash and to demoralise the Australians yet further before Ashes 2013 2.0 starts at Brisbane in November.

And yet part of the worry resides in that last paragraph. Talk of 5-0 – with three games still to go, for heaven’s sake – is so rife amid excitable onlookers that you wonder about the threat of the C-word. And, by their own admission, England have fallen victim to complacency before – most notably when they went to the UAE 18 months ago and lost 3-0 to Pakistan.

The possibility of a whitewash has begun to creep out of the side of players’ mouths as well. It would be disingenuous of a journalist to grumble about this, because the job is easier when the headlines write themselves. But talk of creating history is generally best left to after it has been created.

Again, there is precedent. Before England went to the UAE, there had been chat about leaving a legacy. Now, they are on the brink of a third straight Ashes win, one of them by the skin of their teeth. Yet not so long ago Australia won eight in a row. The decent thing would be for any English braying to wait.

Perhaps, though, you can hardly blame them for harbouring a sense of quiet confidence. Alastair Cook and Jonathan Trott – makers of 1,211 runs during the last Ashes series at a combined average of 110 – have been unusually quiet so far, even taking into account their mutual history of struggles at Trent Bridge.

And in Nottingham, England’s attack was worryingly reliant on James Anderson. The feeling remains that, if Cook’s men get it together and overcome the need for a century from Ian Bell, things could grow even messier for Australia.

The key for England is not to feel squeamish about this. And what selector James Whitaker saw at Hove over the weekend will not have translated into messages of doom to the England dressing-room.

In essence, Australia are making it up as they go along – as they have been ever since they sacked Mickey Arthur with two weeks to go before the first Test. The rest has been about botching, the traditionally English pastime of patching and repairing that has been given a twist by the Australians, who have patched rather more than they have repaired.

The constant restructuring of the batting line-up has typified the tendency. Apart from the openers, no one in the top six has been given a defined role – not even Michael Clarke, who seems torn between proving he’s not scared of No 4 and taking refuge in his natural home at No 5.

And at Hove, they made the curious decision not to give Shane Watson and Chris Rogers another chance to cement an opening partnership that has had its moments – notably while they were adding 84 in the second innings at Trent Bridge – but at Lord’s descended into one big lbw fiasco.

Lording it: England are delighted after winning the second Test - now they can show they're ruthless by winning the three remaining matches

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While his team-mates were conceding a two-run first-innings deficit to Sussex at Hove, Watson stayed in London to work on his tendency to plant and play fatally around his first foot. There are two ways of interpreting this, and Watson seems forever to attract the less favourable one.

Regardless of which Australians are picked for Old Trafford, it’s hard to escape the feeling that they have not morphed into some approximation of England teams of old: the longer a player stays out of the team, the better he gets. Just ask David Warner.

With the narrative of a close series apparently having disappeared on the final afternoon at Trent Bridge, England fans can claim that all that remains is for them to create history and match Australia’s 5-0 Ashes wins in 1920-21 and 2006-07.

And they shouldn’t need the fillip of rewriting the record books to motivate them. Because aspiring to ruthlessness will do the job by itself. This series has not lost all its interest just yet.

Looking good now: David Warner (left) has become a better player in his absence

THAT WAS THE WEEK THAT WAS

An unlikely love story

For those of you labouring under the delusion that N Srinivasan was forced to step down as president of the BCCI because his Chennai Super Kings franchise were at the heart of the IPL’s latest loss of credibility, we have some good news! Srini has claimed that the real cause of his demise was because people were jealous… of the fact that he had MS Dhoni.

As news of this unlikely bromance took the cricket world by storm, Srini told a group of students at the Alagappa College of Technology: ‘Why do you think people are jealous of CSK? It is because of Dhoni. There was a savage attack on me because I have Dhoni.’

Jealousy? According to N Srinivasan, Chennai Super Kings have been attacked because they have India captain MS Dhoni (centre)

Sticking to his defence of a captain who has proved adept at winning limited-overs trophies but presided over a disastrous sequence of 10 defeats in 16 Tests before the 4-0 duffing-up of Australia in March, Srini hailed ‘an intelligent cricketer and a simple man’. The question on everyone’s lips is: is the feeling mutual?

Turning the other cheek

To judge by comments on talkboards, it seems some believe the media are deliberately ramping up David Warner’s spat with Thami Tsolekile in Pretoria last week. Possibly. But if you were on your last warning, and had just given an interview admitting that the Joe Root/Walkabout incident was a ‘kick up the backside’, wouldn’t you do everything in your power to stay out of the headlines?

And away we go…

Last week this column suggested that Cricket South Africa’s appointment as chief executive of Haroon Lorgat, nemesis of the BCCI, was either brave or foolish. Now come reports that the BCCI are considering shortening India’s tour to South Africa later this year by way of retaliation for CSA daring to appoint the chief exec of their choice; and they could also end CSA’s stake in the money-spinning Champions League. Like we said: brave – or foolish.